Many activities, both recreational and work related entail placing certain joints of the body into contact with surfaces which over time tend to lead to discomfort and even injury. People who work on their knees such as carpet layers, roofers, welders, mechanics and agricultural workers, to name a few, benefit from knee protection.
Currently, the only inexpensive generic knee protection available to the consumer consists of various forms of knee pads. FIG. 1 shows a typical knee pad which comprises a block 1 of resilient compressible material which is attached to a fabric sheet 2 which in turn is held in place over the front of the knee by straps 3,4 wrapping around the back of the knee. To fit different sized knees, the straps are usually adjustable by being elastic, using a buckle or using other means.
Although this type of knee protector is inexpensive, it suffers from a lack of functionality in four key areas. First, it is not held in place on the front of the knee as securely as is sometimes desired. Lateral forces can easily move the protector off center or it can work itself off of the kneecap through repeated movement. The usual solution to this problem would be increasing the strength or coverage of the straps. However this solution tends to reduce flexibility and comfort over extended periods of time.
Second, it does not have a hard rigid outer casing to protect the knee from sharp objects or surfaces and from scuffing. Those that have been designed with hard outer plates 5 as shown in FIG. 2, have increased trouble maintaining their position over a kneecap and provide protection only to a limited portion of the front of the knee. The coverage changes depending on whether the user's knee is straight or bent. This plate further tends to restrict the movement of the user's knee.
Third, these products suffer from not providing the proper adhesion when working on different types of surfaces. Those devices that do provide adequate adhesion on one surface such as roofing tiles do not allow the sliding required by carpet layers. Also, devices designed for one surface may suffer from wearing out too quickly when used on another surface.
Finally, most of these devices employ means for attaching which are relatively inconvenient or uncomfortable. Those devices which use single length elastic straps can, over time, become quite irritating to the user if they are too tight or too loose. Those devices with adjustable attachment straps either require too much time to attach and take off, or cannot be set to a predetermined size by the user, requiring tightening or loosening each time the user uses the product.
It would therefore be desirable to have an inexpensive product for protecting a user's knee or other exposed joint with a protector that remains situated over the user's joint comfortably and more securely than current designs, allows total freedom of movement while maintaining full coverage protection, allows quick and simple attachment and detachment in a consistent manner, provides for simple and easy repair and replacement of its components such as the padding, and provides proper adhesion to a variety of surfaces for a wide variety of applications.